PSYCHO-PASS – 01

“Ei incumbit probatio qui dicit, non qui negat. The burden of proof lies with who declares, not who denies.” This principle – that one is considered innocent until proven guilty – is considered such a fundamental right that it is found in many of the world’s constitutions and legal codes. Yet in the futuristic world of PSYCHO-PASS, this right does not exist. This disparity alone is already enough of a premise for an intelligent show, but Urobuchi Gen’s original series isn’t merely some dialogue heavy courtroom drama – it’s the marriage of the science-fiction and detective genres, one in the vein of movies like Blade Runner and Minority Report. This premiere definitely raised thought-provoking questions in lockstep with thrills that can only be found at the end of a gun, but will it be able to smartly answer the issues it raises while sustaining a high level of action and tension like the best science-fiction detective dramas have to offer?

An introduction to PSYCHO-PASS’s dystopian legal system is no easy task. While it was a clever choice to use Tsunemori Akane’s (Hanazawa Kana) first case as a rookie Criminal Investigation Department (CID) Inspector to explain its intricacies and raise the crucial thought-provoking questions, the execution left much to be desired. It’s hard to believe how the top-ranked student in the city’s CID academy could be so clueless about way the legal system works.

Instead, Tsunemori needed fellow Inspector Ginoza Nobuchika (Nokima Kenji) to explain that the foundation to their city’s legal system is presumably a supercomputer of some sort called Sibyl, which through using either Dominator handguns or street scanners as its eyes, is able to instantly give a quantitative measure of a person’s propensity or latent capacity for committing crime. This number is called the ‘crime coefficient’ or the titular ‘Psycho-Pass’, and if it is above a certain threshold, the offending individual is captured and taken away for therapy by the CID, using force if necessary. As for the misnamed police force (after all, what are they really investigating if everyone is already guilty?), instead of protecting the peace in the name of law and justice, the caduceus emblazoned on the back of their jackets seems to suggest that they fashion themselves as more of disease control agency. The CID probably sees latent criminals as nothing more than people who have a disease, a cancer to society, which must be treated before it manifests into something even more dangerous.

Tsunemori’s first case is a simple one – apprehending a man, Okura Nobuo, who was randomly found to have latent criminal tendencies by a street scanner and refused to turn himself over for treatment when confronted by a security drone. While this case might not have been “epic” as people might have expected for a premiere, but its straightforward and uncomplicated nature effectively showcased the legal system of the PSYCHO-PASS world as well as gave an avenue for Tsunemori to voice her issues with it, many of which most viewers probably had as well.

Already we have a multitude of questions that go above and beyond the simple lack of presumption of innocence. Who designed Sibyl – was it a government agency or private corporation? How does it work? How is the threshold number delineating a latent criminal from a law-abiding individual determined? What if labeling a person as a latent criminal is actually what instigates their criminal behavior, as could have very well been the case for Okura? How do you deal with cases of ‘psycho-hazard’, where one latent criminal causes enough stress for a bystander or hostage that they become a latent criminal in Sibyl’s eyes? And what if like Ginoza said, a high crime coefficient is only the temporary and unlucky result of incompatible medication? So while PSYCHO-PASS does go far in raising many thought-provoking questions like these in its first twenty odd minutes, it will still need to answer them smartly as well, if it is to be considered as a show of substance.

The other piece of the pie to an entertaining sci-fi detective show or flick is the action and tension that helps lessen the blow of the heavy dialogue. The premiere episode fared slightly better in this regard, at least with its tension. Much of it is based on a twist that could turn out to be the most interesting aspect of the series – the fact that Tsunemori and Ginoza’s partners/subordinates, the CID enforcement officers who are tasked with helping them apprehend these latent criminals, are they themselves latent criminals. Somehow, this is another fact that seemingly caught our hapless heroine off guard – just what exactly are they teaching at the CID academy?

By their outward appearances and (mostly) professional demeanor, the Enforcer team consisting of girl-crazy Kagari Shuusei (Ishida Akira), straight-laced Kunizuka Yayoi (Itou Shizuka), jovial veteran cop Masaoka Tomomi (Arimoto Kinryuu), and the stoic enforcer Kougami Shinya (Seki Tomokazu) doesn’t resemble anything like the people of “bankrupt character” as Ginoza describes them, but according to their crime coefficient, they’re nothing more than the “beasts used to hunt other beasts.” This twist to the standard buddy cop setup is rife with various possibilities and issues that can be raised. For one, Tsunemori will likely have a more personal connection to the issues of latent criminals and the consequences of a high crime coefficient through her relationship with Kougami, but at the same time, she must continually judge his actions to see if they fall in line with her own morals, like she does at the end of this episode. Hopefully, this twist will add to PSYCHO-PASS the element of tension to that is so crucial to a compelling detective drama.

Production I.G and director Shiotanai Naoyoshi have done a commendable job of capturing the dark and gritty underbelly of a futuristic metropolis. The animation may not reach the heady heights of K, but it does look a step above most shows at the very least. So far, the art direction is spot on with the cyberpunk aesthetic as well, depicting a gloomy cityscape soaked in a never ending rainstorm and cloaked in a perpetual nighttime with only the glow from the neon signage to break up the shadows. Urobuchi Gen’s famous penchant for gratuity and torture was immediately evident in this premiere, as was his now trademark choking scene, but it remains to be scene exactly what quality his script will attain. As for the pacing, it has been spot on, neither too fast nor too slow for my tastes. My main wish for the rest of the series is for Kougami to become the main character instead of the bumbling Tsunemori, which the in media res opening with Kougami facing off against a mysterious Makishima Shougo (Sakurai Takahiro) seems to suggest.

A less than stellar premiere aside, PSYCHO-PASS still manages to raise the thought-provoking questions like the best sci-fi should and deliver action and tension on par with the best of the detective genre as well. Yet the jury is still out on whether the series can smartly answer all these serious questions while maintaining a high level of action and tension to keep it entertaining. All told, I believe PSYCHO-PASS still has what it takes to excel as a dystopian sci-fi detective series.

Somehow I got the idea that Akane was assigned to the CID exactly due to being a top student in the academy. Either way, we still don’t know if such a system is supposed to be widespreadly known (I mean, everyone knows what it consists in, but as seen when the guy they were trying to capture reaches for the gun, he had no idea what that thing was or how it worked), so it might be possible only that knowledge of the exact workings of the system are only known to the department with the duty of applying them. As we still don’t know that much about the portrayed society, we can’t say that much yet. But even if it is supposed to be taught in the academy, for the sake of exposition I guess it’s a detail that can be easily overlooked.

I actually thought the execution of this series was pretty good. In just one episode, they did not only introduce the premise, which, as you pointed out, raises enough interesting questions in itself, but was also packed with thought-provoking developments which permitted further questioning regarding certain issues. All this with a rather flawless pacing. After this episode I have high expectations for this.

First I liked this show And second this is not a really direct response to Dusk252, but I just like being near the top, ah ha ha ha! Anyway I’d hate to break it to many of the fans here, but it appears that “some” people are not totally blown away like many of you here.

I am a good pal, so I even gave y’all the link. Me? I’ve already said that I liked this show. This was very good start, sure there were some teeny tiny minor irritating flaws, but I am willing to let them go and enjoy. I am just pointing Enzo’s take to let y’all know that it’s okay to criticize a show like Enzo did and still enjoy it. If I or anyone else try to say anything negative about this show or any here at RC (although some shows really deserve some bashing for their shameless mediocrity and I do it with pleasure and people here hated me for it, sigh~), I get bamboozled with negs!!

To actually respond to Dusk252 comment, I got the same impression, as I know a few people that work for higher security government jobs and the application process is pretty blind. You usually come in with not prior job specific training but a whole whack of screen to see if your personality and thinking process is compatible.

In Akane’s case the policing job it a matter of execution rather then thinking in this world which smack of so much wrong as Akane and the worlds view of what an policing job is still set before the PSYCHO-PASS’s dystopian legal system. Also the commanding office mention she was pulled on the feild on her first day, meaning no one had shown her the ropes yet. Trail by fire for this rookie.

The need to keep the working of the system to a select few is probably the bases of the conflict in this world.

I’s been awhile since I’ve been this drown into the action and premise of a show, the a credits hit I didn’t want it to end and was wondering wher those 23 minutes went!

I have a feeling this will be one of the best anime of this season.
From the amazing, addictive music to the great animation and the awesome character design by Akira Amano (huge fan of her drawings)I re-watched this episode like 4 times already.

I have a feeling some people may start thinking Akane’s character as a nuisance since her kindness could potentially harm her team-mates, but her sweet characteristics is quite a nice contrast to the rest of the characters who all seem to have a dark past.

The male characters are fine, but I don’t really like how the eyes of the female lead are drawn. They’re the exact same as the ones found in Kyouko and that other girl, but not the other female characters. Basically the eyes that denote the fact that the character is a useless one… At least in Reborn.

Isn’t the Pshyco-Pass system flawed?
In the opening scene the guy trying to KILL Shinya, couldn’t be shoot, so what he is not a “criminal-in-waiting”? He is trying to kill someone…
The isn’t the Psyco-Pass more like a “Stress-Pass”?
Tha if someone, a real psychopathic, who doesn’t feel a thing about killing people, wouldn’t he just be ignored by Sybil?

And why to I get the impression that Shinya is just a pshyco who loves killing people?
The guy in the OP scene, couldn’t be shoot so what Shinya did?
Throw him out of a window, raise his “Psyco-Pass”, it more just a Stress-Pass, and shoot him while he is falling from a dam skyscraper, was there really a need to shoot him?
And with the hostage turned “Criminal-in-waiting”, one he was smiling and said something to Nobuchika just to taunt her, two, why the fuck his gun was in “meat-explosion” mode, while all others where in Paralyse mode?

I doubt that Psycho-pass is just a stress-pass .. there is more to it than that .. when our heroine pointed her gun at her partner (the old guy with the cyborg hand) it showed a high rating despite him being friendly and he didn’t seem to be under stress at all.

Even when she shot Shinya, if he was the cold blooded killer who doesn’t give a damn about anything and doesn’t feel any stress or remorse when killing humans she wouldn’t have been able to even shoot him with paralyzier mode.

As to why the gun didn’t work on the guy from the start .. i think there is a more complicated reason for that .. maybe the gun doesn’t work on people inside the building (as some sort of security measure) or something else .. and we don’t know any details about who that guy was or what Shinya was doing there.

I was thinking the same about the inside building thing, but when Kagari shout Okura they wer inside the building too.

The reason the gun didn’t work is probably due to the helmet he was wearing. The sibyl eye pretty much scans their mentality and estimates their Psycho-pass lvl. If that helmet prevents the eye to work, then it makes sense that Shinya had to Break the cord of the helm before he was able to shoot him.

Think of it like this.
In real life, when you have mental illness, they prescribe you medicine. Even if you have committed crime, if you plead insanity, they send you to a hospital instead of jail.
Flip that around and in the world of Psycho-Pass. Even if you have not done anything wrong YET, just by having twisted fantasies or showing signs of psychosis, you get apprehended as a criminal (or more like pest that needs to be quarantined from what I’ve seen), regardless of circumstances. It’s like they just let AI take over, judge everything purely by data and people have become sheep without heart – also kind of like a thought police, typical dystopian method of controlling by fear.

But the system is not absolute as they spare ones that are ‘useful,’ however bad of a criminal they may be. I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s really corrupted in the core and those who are in the power are safe from it (when they’re the ones who need to be apprehended the most). Just like the real world. :P

The gun worked on that guy when Shinya threw him out of the building, so the building itself must have some kind of measure that prevents it from working. I don’t think a master criminal like Shogo appears to be would hole himself up in some place where he and his lackeys could easily be shot by that gun.

I think you might not have noticed but in that fight the “enemy” was using some kind of special headgear that probably blocked the ability to scan the “crime coeficient”. What Shinya did was kick him in the head and break the protection and then he was able to use the Dominator. He shot that “enemy” while falling because that’s what he is meant to do. To use the Dominator and shoot the criminals.

And the reason the gun used paralyze mode on Shinya is that in the default mode according to the old guy it’s set in paralyze.

But if it was just the mask there would have been no need to throw the guy out of the building .. my guess is that the building itself was equipped with a system that prevents shooting people inside it with lethal mode (so the people inside can actually shoot anyone outside the building but they can’t fire back at them as long as they are holed inside it).

As for the mask .. maybe it just broke by chance .. but i guess we will have to wait for the next few episodes to understand the full rules by which this gun works .. when/where and on whom does work on when/where and on whom it doesn’t.

Psycho-pass so far seems quite promising, the cyber-punk mood and edgy atmosphere are top-notch Production I.G trademark when it comes to serious Sci-fi .. in that episode i got vibes of Ghost in the shell, Blade Runner, Minority Report and even Gantz (guns that make people explode with invisible energy waves).

I did like the “new recruit” plot-device being used to explain things to us as well .. this crime-fighting business is as alien and new to her as much as it is to us .. so this way not only can the exposition actually feel meaningful but it makes it easier to relate to her (and it’s funny that not only she feels out of place story-wise .. but even her character design -specially her big eyes- makes here feel out of place .. IMO that was intentional).

The only thing that bugged me is the excessive use of force .. with aliens in Gantz i can totally understand needing guns that blow them apart to tiny pieces .. but seriously .. why the heck does those guns switch from non-lethal paralyzer into pulverizing invincible ray of doom .. it’s just too extreme .. there should have been some sort of middle-ground there (i.e i thought when the guy in the end of the episode got shot with lethal mode that only his arm will be shot/severed/explode .. but he completely blew up in the most gruesome way possible as if he was hit by a tank shell XD).

I still think there at least needs to be a way to control the strength of that death ray to minimize the messy results and leave something for forensics to work with (it would be silly to assume that all crime cases will just involve a single desperate guy .. what if it is a case of a serious crime network or something that needs tracking evidence and such .. blowing up people this way will leave little evidence to work with) .. not to mention with crazy guns like these they will always end up with very messy crime scenes (imagine if there were 3 to 4 more guys involved that got exploded .. yikes XD).

Actually the way they treated the “victim” immediately as a criminal because her “rating” was high in this episode showed that everyone (except our heroine) is following the directions of the AI that scans people’s psyche without any consideration to the circumstances and common sense .. the logic they use is simply that if you see someone with criminal potential shoot tranqulizer .. if you see someone with a too high rating blow the shit our of them regardless of what reason induced that so-called high-rating.

I guess that will be one of the main sources of conflict between our heroine and the other force members .. no .. actually the entire system .. she might end up bringing it all down .. she might not look it .. but she is quite tough seeing she didn’t hesitate a sec to shoot the enforcer before he killed the “victim” which clearly had a high “rating” because of the shit she has been through in the past few hours before they saved her (ironically the way they treated the guy who caused all this mess is what ended up turning him into a criminal and also turned his own victim into a potential criminal according to the flawed logic of that AI that controls the system).

Also .. does anyone else see the “pun” in the series title .. Psycho-pass = psychopath XD

Oh no, I.G made a huge show(GC) and failed to deliver in the end. That makes them a joke studio!!!

You’ve probably only been watching anime for the past 2 years and GC was the first big anime to fail in your eyes but plenty of studios mess up. I.G hired the wrong writers for GC, simple as that really.

Pretty dumb to dismiss the entire studio because of 2 or 3 people. GC was superber in most other aspects.

I don’t think GC makes them a joke studio, but it does make me lose trust in them to make a show with passable content. Just like how I don’t trust George Lucas anymore to make a decent Star Wars movie, but you get the point

i’d rather he joke about Psycho-Pass itself than I.G
GC is a big blunder in their science fiction works but no one creates better sci-fi anime better than them
go learn your anime history and see who brought occult hits like Patlabor and Ghost in the Shell.

So many similarities between Ghost in the Shell and Psyco Pass, of course this is something not suppose to be surprised since both are produced by Production IG

similar storyboard arrangement – can easily tell from the 1st few secs from the beginning
similar background setting – Hong Kong type district
similar colour setting – there is one part with really strong colour contrast which instantly reminds me of the second movie : Innocence
similar atmosphere – raining scene
and my favourite Tachikomas vs Drones

Actually, I think what she did will probably be important to the plot later on.

I’ll put my reason for thinking that into spoiler, even if it is only speculation.Show Spoiler ▼

When the criminals status got updated to allow lethal shots, Masaoka said that the Sybil system ranked him as a person who is no longer needed to the world. However when the victims Psycho-Pass got this update and Akane saved her, it recovered back to “normal” criminal levels, showing another flaw in the system. Not all people who have a high number on their psycho-pass need to be killed.

actually even though i thought akane was kind of annoying too (cos of how ignorant she seems of the basic stuff), i do understand where she’s getting at.
the crazy guy keeps traumatizing her saying she’ll get locked up like others with ‘psycho pass’. even if it’s merely a paralyzer, getting therapy (in probably an enclosed area) may just tip her off the sanity balance. she did calm down when akane shot Kougami, it’s not like it’s impossible to get across to her, even though she experienced such a shock

I’ve decided to post here before I watch this episode to talk about the undeniable problem of noitamina’s last majorly hyped and well credentialed original production: Expectation.

We have no idea how this story will go, but apparently this episode was a good start. However, whatever path this series goes, I’m going to take a page from the law that the CID does not imploy: Innocent until proven guilty.

That was a great first episode, simple yet action pack, straightforward and very easy to follow but full of interesting stuff and questions that I hope they will answer through the rest of this series. I want more of this stuff in my Anime.

So much stuff happens, I don’t know where to start. I might as well not saying anything at all. ^^;

As for the anime itself, I’m totally hooked. This is to be expected considering the success of Madoka and Fate/Zero, 2 great masterpiece by Gen Urobuchi. Can’t wait to see if Psycho-Pass will live up to the awesomeness of Gen’s previous.

PS: Am I the only one who felt that the song by Egoist seems a bit too “light” for the dark and gritty setting of the world in Psycho-Pass?

Stop giving negs for even mild negative posts like this, you people! (it’s only just started, but I can smell a mob forming already for poor EmD).

Geez, seriously it’s no wonder why RC’s recent reputation of cheerleading site!! EmD didn’t even say anything negative about the show and she/he has every right to dislike a character and write about it here. Negs should really reserve for trolling or really offensive stuff!! This trigger-happy mob behavior really give me grief these days at RC.

Thanks for the defense but I’m not too bothered. A lot of fans are irrational when it comes to girls they find cute, like that guy that stabbed his Azusa doll just because her VA was revealed to be sexually active with her boyfriend (what a crime!)

I’m guessing the thumbs down come from readers who think she’s ‘cute’ and want her as their ‘waifu.’

I’ve given you an upvote because of your advocating to scrap the downvoting system, which RC detractors outside are now using as a stick to beat it as a mere “cheerleading” site.

I have no qualms with engaging with people who dislike a show, as long as they can back their argument and act in a civil manner (i.e. non-troll/combative behaviour).

The advent of downvoting has just made people lazy in replying to an opinion they couldn’t agree with. Sure you might argue that downvoting helps keeps trolls away, but in the past when Omni was King, he simply clamped down hard on trolling behaviour without relying on these.

By all means, keep the upvoting to encourage quality posting, but scrap the downvoting to get people off their bums and actually engage in meaningful conversation.

I think that the downvoting system gives a way for people who wouldn’t comment anyway to have a say about whether or not they think you have left a good comment/agree with your comment. Some comments don’t even deserve a reply, and there’s also the situation where someone has already left a great reply, so why repeat things when you can just voice your opinion with a downvote? I feel it can be a good indicator of what the community consensus is about your comment.

Why are you so bothered by downvotes, even when it’s only a single one? In the real world, you’ll seldom find 100% agreement anyway, so scrapping downvotes might actually serve to perpetuate an illusion that what you say is better received than it actually is…

“I think that the downvoting system gives a way for people who wouldn’t comment anyway to have a say about whether or not they think you have left a good comment/agree with your comment.”

Like I said, save it for the good comments. As usually disagreeing requires a more thorough thought process (reason needed, as poster needs to explain why his thoughts are opposite to person he is disagreeing with) than agreeing (reason not needed, as poster’s thoughts are entirely in line with person he is agreeing with).

“Some comments don’t even deserve a reply, and there’s also the situation where someone has already left a great reply, so why repeat things when you can just voice your opinion with a downvote? I feel it can be a good indicator of what the community consensus is about your comment.”

Community consensus? Sometimes just because people don’t upvote a person’s comment doesn’t mean they disagree with him, thus leading to strange occasions where a person’s comment appears more unpopular than it would seem as the downvoting people are more motivated to downvote that guy. I’ve seen it quite a few times even when said poster articulated his points well and was entirely non-offensive.

“Why are you so bothered by downvotes, even when it’s only a single one? In the real world, you’ll seldom find 100% agreement anyway, so scrapping downvotes might actually serve to perpetuate an illusion that what you say is better received than it actually is…”

I am bothered by them besides reasons explained above, occasionally downvotes have appeared for the most harmless objective neutral post (posts like “Hey, this special episode has a different OP/ED from usual” – a seemingly observational post like that getting downvotes for no reason can be very annoying).

As with my paragraph above, just as you may argue that no downvotes might perpetuate an illusion, so too would keeping downvotes, as not everybody is bothered to upvote even if they feel what they said makes sense.

I would rather live in a positive illusion than a negative illusion. What harm could that do? If I was trolling, I would have easily attracted a reaction and mod action.

I heard rumor about his latest lightnovel to be pretty much idealistic and no gory violence involved. Shame I don’t remember the title. The story is about a jetplane pilot racing against dragons or something like that.

Actually, the first time I heard Urobuchi was gonna script an anime for this fall months ago, I thought it would an adaptation for this novel of his.

Interesting facts:
- Sibyl = Latin for Prophetess. To quote:
“The Sibyl, with frenzied mouth uttering things not to be laughed at, unadorned and unperfumed, yet reaches to a thousand years with her voice by aid of the god”

If this is what this system is based on, then it basically makes predictions based on currnet psychological and physiological data only. Yeah, big flaw there already.

Yes! I was waiting for this review!
First, Im so glad to hear Seki Tomokazu again. I was wondering how he didnt nail a spot in K. The OST was very awesome aswell….and it seems like EGOIST is very much active after the events of Guilty Crown lol.

Seriously this season has many good shows that have a good mix of shojous, shonens, moe/ecchi (of course) and even a dark scifi ones like this and Shinsekai. The only thing not present is prob BL! lol

Isn’t sad that every time I see a futuristic anime show with a gun, I think “Cowboy Bebop”! Gosh, how many years has it been and yet that’s how awesome that show was to me. Well, I could’ve easily thought “Ghost in the Shell” as well, but I liked CB much better. So you see, I can sort of forgive the writers for this show for hashing up some old concept from (one might say “ripping off”) CW, such as the main loner guy, whom obviously is borrowed heavily from Spike (minus jeet kune do), with his mannerism and all. AND I don’t need to tell y’all what that old guy who has ONE robotic (RIGHT) arm is based on, or the bad white long hairdo guy is based on. he he he. Hey, at least the old guy is not bald/bearded!! The writers here clearly have some pride, ah ha ha. But if the said bad white long hairdo guy start wielding a Japanese sword… then I will start hating those writers’ guts for being so spineless. We shall see.

Anyhow good things first:

1. the background designs and drawing are freaking gorgeous here. Good thing they poured some money into this shit. It shows! Also very clean-looking throughout. Needless to say, I am impressed. I CAN’T stress this enough. This will make me to forgive many shortcomings that may (or may not) come later.
2. the main loner guy is not crying. Hooray! That’s good. So it’s not another Guilty Crown. Very good.
2. plot seems pretty intriguing. Plot-wise (other than some characters traits), there isn’t much similarities with Cowboy Bebop. More like Minority Report mixed with cop anime like Ghost in the Shell.
3. I like that they didn’t hold back on gore stuff. Human exploding? please. Bowels flying? child, please! It’s all there without any censor. As long as they don’t do it just for the sake of doing it, I’m fine with this gore stuff.
4. pretty much everything else is pretty good.

Now then, my minor grievances:
1. I am not a fan for the character designs. Seems too shojo-ish, especially the main guys, with their pretty boy faces (Oh how I miss you Cowboy Bebop).
2. I also hated that cheesy J-pop thing going-on the background during the opening fight scene (But this one is probably just on me and maybe 2-3 other Japanese anime watchers on earth since my personal view is that I hate J-pop and believe that campy noise sucks)
3. What’s with baby-voiced childish robots for police work? That’s not menacing at all. And this is NOT the first time I see this in Japanese Anime. I suspect that this is Japanese thing. And perhaps these people collective like cute thing so much that they just had to make even police robots like that?? Well they did come up with hello kitty AND they live in the nation that produced those millions of hits of popular cat youtube videos. But seriously if I see some kiddie robot telling me to don’t do, I would just knock it over and tell it to shut it. Not menacing at all and you expect ME or a American (or non-Japanese) to comply? Nonsense I say!! Not realistic at all!
4. a minor plot hole/gaffe: so they say that only the person holding his/her gun can hear what that gun is telling him/her and yet towards the end, the girl hears what the loner guy’s gun is telling him to kill the woman AND reacts that in a real time. C’mon, now, writers! And no, don’t tell me she reacted to the gun changing. That’s too easy and doesn’t really cut it here; she CLEARLY reacted to the comment of gun of the guy. It’s an obvious plot gaffe.

Well again, these are really minor grievances. I liked the show way more, so I can overlook these stuff. The character designs I am stuck with (sigh), so I will have to put up with it, but hopefully they will tone down those J-pop usage. hmm hmm!

Regarding the police robots, The Tachikoma robots from GiTS (another Production I.G series) had AIs with cute baby voices but they could kick the living day lights of you or a terrorist armed to the teeth with weapons .. their cute voice had no impact at all on how lethal or effective they are at their job.

As for the ones in PP, these aren’t cute robots with baby faces .. the robots are just normal bots projecting a big baby-faced hologram .. but that’s besides the point .. the point is that your scenario doesn’t make any sense .. these robots are meant to deal with the public (i.e sort of public relations part of police) and they are cutely and gently warning people not to come close to the crime scene .. they don’t need to intimidate anyone smart enough not approach after the warning .. if someone is stupid enough to try and cross despite the warning (cute or not) i’m 100% sure the robots would mob the floor with him, electrocute and knock him out cold before he even moves one step inside .. just because something looks and/or sounds cute doesn’t mean they can’t hurt you .. badly (even children these days know that, and nature is filled with examples of creatures that look pretty/cute but are extremely lethal .. go watch some National Geographic programs or something XD)

It’s hard to believe how the top-ranked student in the city’s CID academy could be so clueless about way the legal system works.

Well, it seems that the whole deal with Dominators is unknown to the general public, since the perp didn’t know how a Dominator works (if he did, he wouldn’t try to shoot with it). Which makes sense in a dystopian setting – as long as you love Big Brother, you don’t need to care about the ways he fixes the errors in the system.

And they do teach the CID about all this stuff – in this very episode. It was supposed to be a very easy case for Akane to get used to the routine, but then it got very ugly very quickly. She may have written a thesis (which is only tangentially related to field work), but she has zero field experience. I do think that the episode didn’t explain some things as clearly as it could, but the answers are still there if you put some thought into it.

The general public might not know about Dominators, but Tsunemori should have, given that she stated she had received some training on its use.

I felt that a lot of the stuff the CID “taught” her in this episode should have been covered before she even stepped out on the field and given a gun. When you get to field work, it really should only be a way to practice what you’ve learned, not where you learn about the whole legal system.

But would that be the better way to introduce the system the viewers? Sure, there are better in-universe options of teaching her how things work, but showing an actual case is a fine way of explaining it from the direction standpoint, too. Not perfect, sure, but still plausible.

Well, who can say what the future will be like? We can only hope its not like this series… But I like the setting so far, it reminds me much of the Blade Runner, from the dystopian rain-soaked city to the operators being latent criminals themselves (it is hinted that Deckard might be a replicant himself, in the BR…)
While it seems our rookie agent is well trained at school, some things just have to be seen and witnessed yourself.
It is worth noting that “crime coefficient” seems to be a highly dynamic variable, and much depending not only on the stress/mental resilience level of the individual. The panicked girl getting flammable liquids and lighter IS actually creating a danger of major fire erupting and possibly human casualties.
I also noted how inspectors controlling “operators” are thrown into the equation as a stabilizing factor and safety guard. To what extent they are succesful at it?
I am definitely going to watch this, especially as I wonder whether there will be any sort of rebellion against the inherent flaws of the system, and myriad ways to abuse it (forget framing someone into murder, just harass him enogh to become “latent criminal” – who of us didnt had a death wish towards some jerk in our lives?).
I am also sure there can be a point where inspectors themselves might become lgitimate target due to events they are involved with…
Last but not least it would be good if we can find out what events led to such drastic change in the working of justice system…

It might be the mood or time of day I watched it under, but I felt that the first episode was strangely lackluster. I still can’t put my finger on it, but something felt a little off. Although, considering it is a Urobochi work, I might as well scratch it off to a slow and safe start.

That being said, the environment, premise, feeling…the aura of the show is already quite well established. No shortage of effort was seen in this first episode. I am still a little apprehensive about how much faith I should put into the show, but I’m sure that wall will fall soon.

I don’t have high expectations for PP, but to be honest the first episode didn’t do it for me. I don’t know if it’s because most of the other shows have been amazing so far, so i got spoiled or something, but this episode was average at best for me.
The setting is ok, though there are shows with much more interesting and original settings this season. Also, am i the only one who thinks akane is annoying?
Either way, I hope this show get’s more interesting starting next episode, because I’d like to see more of the other characters.

From the first episode, some things I learned from the system are:
-the Dominator could adjust itself according to the target PP (non-lethal to lethal, and vice versa)
-the Sibyl put emotional stress as tendency to do crime, and thus, high PP

However, there are also some things that have not been explained,
-whether Dominator could shoot its own user, and whether Sibyl could also target its own user and decide his/her PP. The only thing that has been explained is it needs authorization.
-whether Sibyl decide suicide as a crime, and the tendency to do suicide as high PP.

Let’s just say those two points are asssumed to be true. In that case, it is very possible for the police to do suicide (and granted by the Sibyl system using Dominator gun). I wonder if there is at least one later in this series.

Less than stellar? I thought this was the best premiere that the Fall season has to offer hands down! I’ve been looking forward to Psycho-Pass ever since I’ve heard UroGen’s involvement and his stamp certainly keeps the expectations high. Without skipping a single beat, the fluid action scenes, the thought-provoking dialogues and the morally ambiguous characters are classic UroGen that I’ve come to know and love. The depiction of Tsunemori as a young and inexperienced detective contrasts really well with all the grizzled veterans but as you pointed out, it did seem rather odd that she needed every detail of the actual job explained, hopefully there’s a plausible explanation for that minor flaw. Similar to Fate/Zero, it looks like UroGen is staging a grand showdown, pitting two morally opposite characters against each other and I’m probably going to question my personal ideologies again as this unadulterated despair unfolds.

For me, a stellar premiere doesn’t raise qualms about its exposition right off the bat. And also, fluid action scenes? There were barely any action scenes in this episode – just a lot of running and jumping…

So far this show looks promising but so much question arises that I worry that they won’t have enough time/ep to fully answer our questions than half assing everything :/

Although I dislike character Tsunemori I can sympathize with her. School “preps” you for reality or so they say but when you walk through that door the “prepping” is basically useless. -.-

To her it might have been immoral to taser a traumatic hostage but it would at least calm the person down and easier to talk with later on when they take the hostage into custody. … or am I wrong to think that way O.o hmmmm

I was looking forward to this series the most, so my expectations were understandably high. I thought it was a solid premiere, but I wasn’t blown away by it like I was with Shin Sekai Yori. Saddling the rookie with experienced veterans has been done before, so the only fresh take this show took seems to just make the rookie a female (They really tried hard to make her look not “cute”, eh?). Whatever direction they go with her character will be interesting to see. The exposition was clunky, could have been better, but with that out of the way, I’m hoping that we’ll now start getting into the meat of the story. Also, I enjoy graphic violence and gore, but I feel that Gen Urobuchi’s trying too hard to make it as graphic and disturbing as possible? (Rape, Strangulation, Upper torso blown to bits….all in one episode). I don’t mind at all, just saying.

I definitely got a Minority Report feel also from this episode, so I hope they choose not to go the route of Akane being “corrupted” by these Enforcers and then flagged as a latent criminal, forcing her to be on the run, similar to the aforementioned movie. That would be too predictable, and I’m expecting more from a Gen Urobuchi work. I have faith though that wherever the story goes, it won’t disappoint, since I loved Fate/Zero and enjoyed some parts of Madoka. This was a great premiere, nonetheless, in spite of my minor gripes with it. This is exactly my cup of tea, so I’m definitely following this to the end.

While K had all the hype and gorgeous styles, in terms of premise alone, Psycho-Pass no doubt is fighting to be a strong contender for best title of Fall 2012. Madoka Magica (having just watched the movie version in cinema today just to relive the fun) and Fate Zero was just amazing, I do not expect Urobuchi Gen to disappoint.

The Minority Report and Blade Runner vibes are certainly there. And already in this first episode, the inherent flaws of the Sibyl System explored and exposed already – as in the case of Sibyl arbitrarily deciding for a brief moment that the female hostage was deemed a threat to be exterminated simply because she was still suffering from the trauma of being taken hostage and raped, before Akane’s intervention lowered it back down.

(Though this being a Urobuchi Gen story, expect Akane’s idealism to be knocked over and shattered to bits. The more she tries to intervene, the more she’ll realize how futile it actually becomes. )

This would suggest many of these Enforcers used to be police detectives as well, particularly in the heavy crimes division, where they would have to deal with psychopathic criminals on a near daily basis, which would end up contaminating their psycho-levels for Sibyl to declare them as “latent criminals” as well.

Well the Judge Dredd gun is certainly nasty when its lethal. I confess that I laughed out loud when the dude EXPLODED though. Talk about over the top. Yes, I’m seriously ***ed up.

I found the first episode to be merely okay. It followed all the sci-fi dystopian setting rules to the letter, grim setting, a flawed Law enforcement system, an idealist to contrast the grimness, etc. Still knowing who the writer is I’m just waiting for the other shoe to drop. Anyone want to guess when that’ll be? I’m going to guess by the third episode.

The whole system is flawed. I wonder how a system came to pass without people objecting to it? First flaw is that just by thinking something bad the scanner will label you a criminal. Then when the scanner is 160, you get killed. There’s also something wrong with the way they kill the individual. Why choose a gory way to die? Kill them in a way that it won’t explode persons. In this case it worsened the situation. The victim saw it all happen that made her coefficient go up. I do hope the show provides a satisfying conclusion like the characters going against the system and removing it.

After violently “terminating” a bunch of people do the detectives’ grief seeds, I mean psycho passes, become corrupted? Did that rookie cop get her job after an adorable white plushie approached her to make a contract?

BTW visuals are the best this season, hope the quality lasts more than one episode.

Due to its status as a “no-go area”, its basically a hotbed of crime (which was why it was scrapped in 1993), its images became an ideal trope inspiration for crime fiction and sci-fi (particularly cyberpunk) writers to use as a “wretched hive of scum and villainy”.

I think I remember Production I.G. using images from Kowloon Walled City for Ghost in the Shell as well.

Really baffling. What is there to dislike about a harmless post about commenting on an art style in an objective, neutral manner? Or does someone hate Hong Kong so much that the mention of something associated with it?

Or it could be like what Germanguy above said, I may have gotten myself a “fan”.

It is just the beginning. I bet they will start to question the credibility of the system. And there will be real psychopaths who don’t have any emotion at all and the system cannot detect it. And maybe others learn how to bypass the system by controlling their emotions or using drugs.

It’s more like a war situation where you throw a book-smart kid who is fresh out of some military school into a real battlefield, into a front-line platoon as a commander. Veteran soldiers like Kougami and Masaoka don’t give a dang no matter how Akane has excelled in the classroom. They do respect her as their superior, but they know she still is just a kid at the same time. Masaoka saw how completely she got overwhelmed by the situation, and decided to lecture anything and everything supposedly she already knew.

TO be frank, Psycho Pass doesn’t seem to pass the bar for an Urobuchi Gen anime adaptation. The premise was lame and cliched for a premiere episode–not something I’d expect from Gen (or perhaps, it’s Production I.G. that I should point my finger to).

I don’t know but Psycho Pass feels inferior to Puella Magi Madoka x Magica and Fate/Zero. In all defense though, it’s above the average when compared with the other anime airing this season.

I too was deeply impressed by this show and am shocked by the lack of love here. The lead girl was whiny in a way that a normal person should be; shes a police officer there to save the victim, not horribly murder her. I assume that the average cop in that town is not involved in the blowing up of suspects, nor is it commonly known by the general public and it would surely be shocking if something like that was revealed to you.

She did her job; her subordinate refused to follow her instruction (to not shoot the victim),
so she had to turn the weapon on him. She warned him, pleaded even, so it should not
have been a surprise to him as he fell to the ground.

She was scared, to be sure, but her actions were not guided by emotion; she didn’t freeze,
kept her mandate in place (to rescue the victim), and held control of the situation under
alarming conditions.

This episode sets the bar very high for our character.

When the victim’s Psycho-pass was downgraded to ‘stun’, I thought, probably like many, that
it’s going to be Minority Report (system vs. the choice of a human), but I really think that
would be too obvious. So I don’t have much of a clue – but that’s the draw of a good series,
isn’t it?

First of all, Im an engineer which currently study informatics and psychology :D

Im very much intrigued on how Sybil and Dominator works… so here’s some piece of mind from me… I hope you guys can provide more insight (note: its in somewhat chronological order)

First point, nanotech (or at least neurotech)
Apparently for me those are very common in every people at that age. Evidence as follows:
- Dominator initialization and tutorial
- Masaoka-san statement (age where people minds are made visible by machines)

Second point, Sybil System
Its definitely an oracle system (Sybil oracle of the perpetrator / criminal) and the fact that numerous ‘eyes’ in form of drones, sensors, and Dominators are a very defining characteristic of a surveillance system and sampling system, which altogether is a vital component for prediction system. If this is the case, then Psychopass is NOT stress level, but the overall coefficient where a subject is deemed unfit or destructive, therefore creates disturbance to society… simply put, a value which measure people life’s worth…

Third point, Dominator
It adjust its engagement mode NOT by user or target situation, but based on Threat Judgement issued by Sybil. The user, as Masaoka-san stated before, are just operator.

If those three points are true, then how Dominator works? In Gantz, the gun shoots explosive nanites to the target, which explode in seconds. Target killed by Dominator Lethal Eliminator did not die in seconds, but instantly… not to mention completely pulverized… Nanites simply cannot react that fast and that violent if just fired mere miliseconds before it happens… which lead to my assumption that:

1> Psychopass can only be read if the individual possess the nanomachines inside their body or if their brain electrochemicals are within expected parameter of normal human condition (this is not necessarily a must, because brainwave reading via external sensor is a possibility too, but it will conflicting with point two)

2> Dominator is merely a portable sensor and signal sender that has trigger, which must be operated by the operator. ‘Weak’ signal set to made the nanomachines haywire, thus paralyze the target, while ‘overkill’ signal cause the nanomachines to violently explode the target from within

3> Sybil system is supposed to be PERFECT… since its prevent crime before it ever existed, suppress the convict before crime even possibly happened, and STILL factoring human in the system (hence Dominator has trigger, not merely auto firing)

Interesting note, caduceus represent ‘messenger’ and ‘negotiation’ as its owned by Hermes, while the correct symbol for health is Rod of Asclepius

I’m actually a psychology major as well with a concentration in neurobiology, but so far I didn’t think the show really gave that much information on how the whole system works yet.

Like I’m not sure exactly how you’re making the jump to nanomachines or “neurotech” inside everyone. Dominator initialization and tutorial can be done with screens embedded inside a contact lens, something that is being researched and designed already. As for the age when minds can be read by machines, this can be explained by developments in brain physiology that occurs at certain ages.

The Dominator gun, if we’re really going to try and stretch anime physics and science to the real world, could be based on a variable focused microwave emitter. Low focused dose to a nerve/nerves to paralyze, strong dose for boiling blood.

Not a psychology major by any means (a pseudo-EE with prelim bkgd in BME), so this might be totally wrong. In any case, I wanted to throw this out here since I haven’t seen it referenced yet. But after watching the episode, I thought about the title’s pun and wondered if the Sybil system’s mechanism for determining crime coefficients is based off the Hare Psychopathy checklist. Again, I could be totally wrong about this, since I have no background in it at all and just happened to peruse it.

As for how Dominator work, I did not believe its microwave radiaton, since the amount of radiation needed to do that much damage, which is boil the blood all the way to torso in a blink, would burn the skin first, and its simply too fast if the case was the body (up to torso and head as well) burst from blood boiling inside. Besides, the arm most likely will burst first before its even reach the shoulder. Simply reading the brainwave externally (if thats the case with Dominator), is quite impractical since there are too much noise from the surroundings. No matter how good the filtering software used, its just simply impractical to integrate that kind of function to a weapon. Based on those composite factors, I assume that there are nanotech involved.

Not overly thrilled with this premiere, but as you said, it has enough potential to be worth the 3-episode trial. That cold opening and Akane’s reaction to the psycho-hazard were definitely surprises in quality. Hoping for the best with this one.